Is it cheaper to own than rent?

The age old argument on whether it is cheaper to rent than own certainly raises it head when considering cloud opportunities for business. One thing for sure it is not black and white when trying to define the total costs involved in rolling out an on premise or even private cloud solution within the business. Organisations will continue to use a huge mix of infrastructure, platforms and applications, but as cloud becomes more and more pervasive they will need to understand the benefits this technology can provide to their business.  

We could focus on subscription based solution offered as a service being an immediate saving to the business, but with a modern day solution the benefits will come from the agility and increase in productivity for the business as a whole. By moving to the cloud your people will spend less time on the low level tasks like configuring and managing  servers, patching and upgrading applications, and more time on the important strategic roles within the business.

When you are developing a cloud strategy it is important to take the pragmatic approach by completing the appropriate analysis of a vendor, making sure your interest is reflected in the providers and local partners operating model. One solution does not fit all and businesses are not identical, so when completing your due diligence it is important you seek a solution that is flexible and can allow you to focus on the strategic view, not the technology.

In house or private cloud servers and applications get deployed slowly, date quickly and have a relatively short life span.  GoodData and Anaplan are powerful tools driving quick deployment programs that set to drive first-rate and rapid results for your business.  Both platforms use AWS and Rackspace, and both cloud vendors live and die by their customers. If you compare that with an on-premise IT deployment you may find the passion, expertise and capability is not as high, and that significant investment required by the business could mean throwing good money away. Consider the servers, building space, cooling, staff, software and general management costs of your on premise system, would you expect the same costs, hidden or otherwise, coming from a subscription based leading cloud solution? With cloud you can take advantage of having your infrastructure stored at a state of the art data centre, while not blowing your entire budget. Let the experts monitor and upgrade the infrastructure and hardware, and spend your time on the more important parts of your business.

One of the biggest advantages of cloud computing is the focus it puts on business user, differentiation and simplicity can be found through the design of a system built from the ground up. Traditional IT clients have a one off transaction with vendors which are repeated every few years for product upgrades or developments, while a cloud solution is continuously creating a better user experience and increasing efficiency within the system. Both Anaplan and GoodData regularly release advancements with the platforms and listen to feature requests of the clients and partners. When deciding on whether you will own or rent an IT solution consider the benefits in agility, flexibility and capability, as well as the total cost of ownership of the cloud.